Only in your Memory
by Love Eternal
Summary: Where the Past and present meet. A girl from Raven's past returns after countless years.
1. Default Chapter

The room was dark, the smell all around Raven was musty, old, untouched. He could hear a heartbeat, his breathing became shallow, his hands began to shake, Shadow watched him. Still. Motionless. The coldness pierced his skin like thousands of needles, all over his body. Then there was light. A pod, like Shadows, a dark human form. An ancient zoidian. His hands brushed across the release control, smoke filled the room, Raven felt blown away, then he was falling. He could hear a Voice. Then a vision, a face. Julia.  
  
Raven awoke inside the cockpit of the genobreaker, beads of sweat slowly trickled down his face, the sun shone directly into his eyes. He wiped his face with his sleeve and waited. He knew somehow that he had had the dream before, but could never remember it. "Julia." The name seemed to echo in his head for a time before he pushed it aside. Usually, the first thing on his mind was where to go, what to do. Now with the Death stinger on the loose and causing havoc, there seemed no reason for him to do the same. Seeing the destruction of his own ways showed him the pain and suffering that he had endured in his life. Now there was nothing else to fight for, only that someone to fight. Vann Freiheit. Today he would lay low for a while, and wait for someone to find him.  
  
******  
  
A girl stood alone on the edge of a cliff overlooking the desert. Her hair was jet black, she had no markings on her face. Her zoid was a silver Liger, customised with five crystal blades. She headed for her cockpit, mobilised her Liger and started for the Army base where Vann Freiheit was residing. As she approached the army base, she viewed the situation below her. A Dibison, Blue Liger and some other type of zoid were training. Their opponent was a gojulas. The three zoids weaved and circled around their opponnent, and then they simultaneously attacked. The attack was precise and flawless.  
  
Below, the gojulas began to fall, when the alarm systems went off. "Warning, warning, there is an intruder on the battle field." The siren began to call.  
  
Vann turned to face the cliffs above him, scanning for an enemy zoid. "Intruder? where? we'll take care of this."  
  
"What if its Raven?" - Thomas  
  
"Well what if it is. If we can't defeat Raven then how are we supposed to beat the death stinger?"  
  
Irvine started to become irritated, "Will you two stop fighting! The Zoid is right there! on the cliff!"  
  
Thomas and Vann stopped fighting and looked towards the cliff to find a liger ready for battle. Julia, took a few steps along the edge of the cliff, then jumped down the full length, and landed gracefully infront of the trio.  
  
"I am Leiutenant Thomas Shuboltz..."  
  
"Not now Thomas!" Van turned towards the silver liger. "This training area is off limits to all but members of the guardian force! Leave now, unless you want a fight on your hands!"  
  
The silver liger didn't move. It just stood there. Julia smiled to herself. "So you're the Vann Freitheit that I've heard so much of. Your name travels far. Is Fiona here?"  
  
"...Huh? Who are you?"  
  
Irvine became agitated with all the questions being thrown around. He had seen the liger before. And... its pilot. "Nevermind that, just attack! We'll ask questions later." At full speed, Irvine charged at Julia, missing her narrowly. In the backround, Thomas started to power up his attack.  
  
Although, the silver liger looked poised for action, Julia became distracted by Fiona and Dr D standing infront of the military base building. She ignored the three pilots and headed in their (Dr D and Fiona) direction. She jumped down from her cockpit and greeted Fiona with a hug.  
  
"Its been a long time." Fiona smiled as the two zoidians embraced.  
  
"Yea, it has been. So are you still out to find Zoid Eve?"  
  
Fiona nodded in response to her question. "But now with the death stinger on the loose... It just doesn't seem as important as stopping hiltz first."  
  
Julia turned to face the Lightning Saix. "Very impressive, so you finally finished it?"  
  
"Yes, its called the Lightning Saix, specially designed for high-speed combat. I see you've finished your zoid aswell?"  
  
At that moment, the very agitated Thomas, Irvine and Vann jumped out of their cockpits. Vann spoke first. "uh... you know eachother?"  
  
"Oh... I'm sorry, this is..."  
  
"Julia. She's a mercenary, one of the worst." Irvine interupted before Fiona could finish.  
  
"Hmph... heard you joined the guardian force Irvine." - Julia  
  
"I'm not part of the guardian force! anyway, what are you doing here? Don't tell me you've come to join the guardian force?"  
  
"I was hired by Dr D." - Julia  
  
"WHAT! Is that right old man?"  
  
Dr D had started to walk inside the base. "Yes... Julia worked with us for sometime on the Zoid eve excavations... Well... enough of this... lets go inside and talk about it over a nice cup of coffee..." 


	2. Dreaming of a Forgotten Past

A small girl was crying in a dark, wet room. She was alone. Raven went up to her. This was so familliar to him. He kneeled down beside her. "Whats wrong?" The girl continued to cry. "Hey..." raven reached out a hand to draw her attention, but his hand came into contact with nothing. It simply went right through her body... The door to the room suddenly opened, and to Raven's surprise, it was a younger version of himself that had entered, along with Shadow.  
  
The younger Raven approached the crying girl. "Prozen's looking for you... What's wrong? Are you hurt?" The crying girl just shook her head. "Stop crying." The younger Raven looked around frantically, as if looking for something. Then from his pocket, he produced a small toy ring, which had a glass jewel on the top. "Here, don't cry."  
  
The little girl stopped crying. She wiped her face. "That face." Raven seemed stunned for a while, this was so familliar, somehow.  
  
The younger Raven gave her the ring and she stood up. She looked at Shadow, smiled and left. Then it was only Raven and shadow in the room. Although it felt stupid, Raven tried to get shadow's attention. "Shadow?" Shadow turned and looked directly at Raven.  
  
"Shadow, Come!" The young Raven had called and shadow was gone, leaving Raven in the room alone.  
  
Suddenly, Raven was surrounded by the murmering sounds of Shadow. He flung his arms around him, in hopes of ridding himself of this sound, when he awoke from yet another dream, to find shadow looking down on him.  
  
******  
  
Fiona and Dr D Lead Julia through the base towards the cafeteria. "So what's the situation so far? What do I need to do?"  
  
"Right now, we're trying to prepare the Ultra-saurus. We need to get rid of the Death Stinger as soon as possible. You might have heard that New Helic City was evacuated because of the death stinger..." Dr D let out a sigh and sipped his tea. "Theres nothing left... Ah... nice and salty, just the way I like it."  
  
"So are you going to fill me in on the battle stradegy?"  
  
"It's called the delta formation. Irvine, Thomas and Vann will create a electromagnetic sheild around the Death stinger to lock it into place. This should give us enough time to fire the Gravity cannon's shells. The shells will create something similar to a black hole, strong enough to destroy the Death Stinger. According to my calculations, if the shell hits, the mission will be a success."  
  
"That's all very fascinating... but where is my part in this?"  
  
"Right... I'm getting to that...you see. there are some factors in the equation that are.. give or take.. if you know what I mean... So if the mission fails, you're the back up plan... After Irvine, Thomas and Vann use the electromagnetic sheild, their zoids will be weakend somewhat."  
  
"Right, so lets do it then."  
  
"Um... Theres just a small problem before we..."  
  
Julia looked confused. "So what's the problem?"  
  
Dr D continued to sip on his salty coffee. "We don't know where the Death Stinger is at the moment."  
  
******  
  
Raven pushed Shadow aside and laid back on the grass, staring up at the night's sky. "... The stars look so close tonight I feel as though I can reach out and touch them!" Raven thought back to his childhood... a happy one where the stars mattered so much to him then, than they did now. He raised a hand towards the sky, as if to take a star from the heavens and keep it for himself. But couldn't reach them. He chuckled for a while to himself... And soon drifted off to sleep...  
  
"Come! I'll show it to you!" A little girl held Raven's hand and lead him up onto a grassy hill. It was night, the moon was full and the stars so bright. They reached the top. "This is my favourite place to be. Do you know why?" Raven stared blankly at her, but the girl just laughed at this and smiled. "It's because the stars are so close, its as if they are watching over me, I feel as though I can reach out and touch them! This is where I come when I feel sad. It's a place where Prozen can never find me!"  
  
"Prozen?... Julia?"  
  
"Hm...?"  
  
"How do you know Prozen?" Julia turned and smiled at Raven, but gave no response. In a matter of seconds, her vision disappeared and was replaced by another scene.  
  
The same girl was being dragged into a car by Prozen and Driven away. Raven approached Prozen. "Where are you taking her?"  
  
Prozen had the same expression on his face... of confidence and power. "Never you mind... You have yet to finish your training. Go now." As Raven was lead away from Prozen, he eyed a small ring on the ground. The same toy ring he had given to Julia. As he went to pick up the ring, he watched the car leave. Julia's face in the window... Stained with tears... 


End file.
